When I first learned that land in US and many other countries can be purchased by anyone in the world, it was mind boggling for me from pure theoretical perspective (actually many government even encourages that). Currently, you need about 3-5 million votes to swing US elections in the desired direction. Now median house price in US is just under $200K. So in theory you can purchase roughly 5 million houses in swing counties for total cost of less than $1T and either leave them vacant or rent out to only people who aligns with your agenda. That's actually not a very large amount to spend over few years when your ROI is literally the ability to control US politics and trade policies almost indefinitely.

In theory, foreign power with deep pockets can buy up large swaths of important land and establish local governments and population that eventually can tilt national politics and policies in desired way. This becomes more and more easier as elections in lot of developed countries often decided by thin margins from very predictable geographical locations. I am not saying this is happening but at least in theory it's possible to design full on economic attack on any country with such laws. Imagine what kind of havoke a foreign government can create if they buy up all aggreculture land and control food prices in peace times and famines in war times. Or buy up key commercial estates critical to producing energy or real estate for even just simple daily needs like gas stations or grocery stores.

This was an actual thing that existed in the UK before the secret ballot and other democratic reforms, when you could effectively own an entire electoral district. They were called "pocket boroughs", i.e. they were in a patron's pocket.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotten_and_pocket_boroughs

This is far too expensive though. It is much cheaper to influence public with fabricated issues about candidates you don't like. May be 1/100th of your estimate.

> elections in lot of developed countries often decided by thin margins from very predictable geographical locations

Actually only in the US and UK. Most other developed countries have evolved beyond the "first past the post" system.

Eh, why bother with the Lex Luther routine when you can just buy congressman for $140k apiece(0)? It's cheaper and easier.

0 - http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2017/03/vote-correlation-int...

Edit: Added a source.

Controlling counties doesn't do anything for you at the national level; you need to reliably control swing states. And if you want to actually control things, you need a great deal of influence over ~10 of them, because the deciding states for a given national issue/election tend to vary.

> Imagine what kind of havoke a foreign government can create if they buy up all aggreculture land and control food prices in peace times and famines in war times

They would also have to invade this country or corrupt the government.

> you must be a citizen of the US to purchase real estate in the US

Why would you want to do that? People want to invest in the United States and give us money, we are instead suppossed to spend money and create a blackmarket to prevent them from doing so at a loss?

> People are living on the streets yet there are empty homes available that aren't for sale and artificially propping up home values in the area

Housing prices are high because government spending on public services that increase the attractiveness of a location subsidizes land ownership whenever these services are paid for using taxes other than taxes on land. The solution is not to ban ownership of land but to tax it.

When government spending is not funded by land taxes, it allows landowners to charge higher rent in response to increased government spending on public services, even if they did not inveset in improving the private property located on the site. With a land value tax, landowners are directly charged for the public services which increase their land value. This means that they have to invest in improving their property if they want to increase their profit, such as by increasing the number of available housing units on the site.

Foreign investors may still buy homes and try to lease them, but they will end up funding the government and public services which only benefit the residents which actually live in the US, and they will be unable to pass on this tax burden to renters.

> Why would you want to do that? People want to invest in the United States and give us money, we are instead suppossed to spend money and create a blackmarket to prevent them from doing so at a loss?

Is this the sort of investment you want? Is this good investment? Driving up the price of housing?

1. Demand is only one factor in the price of housing. Supply is another. Eliminate all density/height/parking restrictions and enforce quality, and only quality regulations and the increase won't be that severe.

2. Don't cap property taxes. Instead use property tax revenues to build cool stuff for the city, among them very wide-ranging, very fast public transit so people can live in suburbs without shitty commutes.

3. Tax unoccupied housing heavily.

Second this. A lot of predatory creditors also want to 'invest' in you.

I think general motivating sentiment is that you want people who actually live and work in the area to be able to given a favored chance at owning a place. That may be conducive to growing and solidifying a community.

Even the low value, or in foreclosure homes are being snapped up; just by the big banks. Who then rent them and sell that rent money as a new subprime asset. Its the subprime mortgage crisis all over again, except shareholders will get the mortgages given up as collateral.

Remember that a _lot_ of people who are in a country are not necessarily citizens. Many have green cards. Some people cannot accept US citizenship without losing their other one (Germans face this quandary, for instance). You can spend an entire life in the US productively and legally and not be a citizen. Barring them from owning a home is problematic.

Take this at face value because I'm too busy to look up citations, but it seems the general trend around the world is to make citizenship harder to acquire, not easier, compounding this issue.

* Full disclosure - I am very biased because I am a resident of a country in which I am not a citizen, and I've been really frustrated by not being able to get a mortgage.

One small clarification:

You can't actually spend your _entire_ life in the US and not be a citizen, since if you're born there you're a citizen. Still, though, the general idea holds.

Actually there are exceptions. You could be a child of diplomats in which case you can be born in the US but not a citizen.

you can hold certain visa status or GC indefinitely. I know GC is renewable every 10 years.

Indeed. That was the point of my comment.

What about companies? Also, what if they enter a contract with an US citizen under which the house is owned by such citizen, but the proceeds of all rentals and sale are to be passed back to the foreign citizen?

It's a can of worms. Once that control is in place, you'll have people flying in to give birth in the US and then immediately purchase property in the name of their newborn.

If foreigners were not allowed to buy that house would also be empty or probably not built.